Posted!

Join the Conversation

Comments

Welcome to our new and improved comments, which are for subscribers only.
This is a test to see whether we can improve the experience for you.
You do not need a Facebook profile to participate.

You will need to register before adding a comment.
Typed comments will be lost if you are not logged in.

Please be polite.
It's OK to disagree with someone's ideas, but personal attacks, insults, threats, hate speech, advocating violence and other violations can result in a ban.
If you see comments in violation of our community guidelines, please report them.

He could ride on the rear wheel of Yoshimura Suzuki teammate Toni Elias and collect a podium. He desperately needed one of those.

Or he could try something no one else would – what almost no one in any form of racing at Road America does with any success – and try to pass around the outside in the Carousel.

If he pulled it off, there was a fair chance Herrin would win. A fair chance, but no guarantee. If he didn’t, he probably was going for a nasty, high-speed slide through the gravel as Elias headed for a weekend Superbike sweep in the Dunlop Championship.

“I think you’ve probably just got to be a little stupid,” Herrin explained to a couple of laughs from his fellow riders but no real argument.

Dust and debris collects in the outside half of the long, fast right-hander. The asphalt has cracks, too, that will grab a front tire and turn it off course.

“I saw it and I was like, ‘Whaaaaat the hell is he doing?’” said Cameron Beaubier, a seven-time Road America winner, whose Yamaha sat third when Herrin made his move.

Herrin had eyed the spot but never really tested it. He’d have just one opportunity.

“I just wanted to take a chance,” the 29-year-old the Herrin said.

Josh Herrin is congratulated on his way to victory lane after winning the second Superbike race of the Dunlop Championship weekend at Road America.(Photo: Dave Kallmann / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

“I’m the kind of person that leaves everything on track. I don’t want to ever go to be Sunday night regretting not trying something. I knew he wouldn’t be expecting it, and I knew all I had to do was get on the side of him. … I kinda got lucky.”

Luckier than Elias, for sure.

While Herrin collected his second victory of the season – 0.506 of a second ahead of Beaubier – Elias was fuming in the gravel trap in the final turn, having dumped his bike and skipped across the pit. Beaubier had already sneaked past and like Herrin had no idea where Elias went until he saw it on one of the big screens scattered around the 4-mile circuit.

“I was expecting to have a draft-off to the line,” Beaubier said. “I knew obviously I wasn’t going to win the race because I was just hanging on by everything I had to stay with them.”

Supersport: One day free of a crash in practice, Bobby Fong moved to the top of the podium, and his Suzuki teammate, Sean Dylan Kelly, grabbed second place at the line, edging Saturday winner Hayden Gillim.

“I wasn’t in the right mindset in the beginning of the race yesterday, just from the crash in qualifying and the crashes in two races at (Virginia International Raceway),” Fong said. “Not saying that affected my performance yesterday, I was just trying to be a little more conservative.”

Stock 1000: Floridian Stefano Mesa narrowly avoided a fallen rider, powered back to the leaders and then drafted to the lead at the white flag en route to his second victory at the track and first in the division.

One day earlier, Mesa fell 0.015 of a second behind Geoff May, and on Sunday, May's crash nearly took him out. Mesa, who won at RA in Supersport in 2012, finished 0.174 of a second ahead of Andrew Lee.

Twins Cup: Draik Beauchamp, a 19-year-old Yamaha racer from Knoxville, Tennessee, won a four-way battle to earn his first victory in the class. Alex Dumas finished 0.319 of a second back.

Liqui Moly Junior Cup: Rocco Landers won a three-way drafting battle to the line to complete a weekend sweep and run his season record to 5 for 6. The 14-year-old from Burns, Oregon, edged Kevin Olmedo by 0.092 of a second with Dallas Daniels, the runner-up Saturday, in third.

Our subscribers make this reporting possible. Please consider supporting local journalism by subscribing to the Journal Sentinel at jsonline.com/deal.